What is a blood moon?

First and foremost, Bible prophecy “experts” have been obsessed with blood moons for centuries. Before we get too far lets define what a blood moon is.

A blood moon is when the moon passes by earth in such a way that an eclipse is formed. The difference between this eclipse is that the moon is positioned opposite of the sun, so the earth is positioned between the sun and the moon. The result is a blood red colored moon.

NOTE: The blood moon should not be confused with the reddish-orange moon we call the “Harvest Moon.” The harvest moon is a full moon that turns red because it is timed and located in such a way that the sun is not yet set and it is illuminated by our atmosphere, much like a red sunset. It is a beautiful site and tends to not to send fundamentalists into prophetic rants.

How often do blood moons happen?

Blood moons are fairly common. Most Americans have seen them. But the frequency at which they occur does depend on your observation point on the earth (geographical location) and also the lunar cycle. We tend to average (currently) about 1 blood moon each year.

A tetrad of blood moons is when 4 of the occur within 2 years. The frequency of these depend on what part of the tetrad cycle we are in. The tetrad cycle usually consists of 600 of infrequent tetrads followed by 300 years of most frequent tetrads. The more frequent periods usually produce about 7 tetrads every 100 years.

Why do people think this is significant?

To be clear, the Bible does not say anything about blood moon tetrads. That being said, crafty TV preachers can make people believe that the Bible says a whole lot that we know isn’t there.

However, it would be unfair to not point out some significant features about these blood moon tetrads. The last handful of them ended up making very very important times in our history. Most Bible prophecy teachers, like John Hagee, believe that the blood moons are specifically dealing with Jewish events. Most people in this vein believe this to be true because (coincidentally) the blood moons fell on Jewish feast days. In fact, it has happened (according to legend) 8 times in all recorded history. So, only 7 times have the 4 blood moons all landed on Jewish feast days. 2014-2015 will be the first time this happened since 1967-68 when Jerusalem was re-captured. Below is complete list of all blood moon tetrads that fell on Jewish feasts.

162-163 A.D. Parthian War begins. Rome expands into Armenia and the middle east all the way to inner Iran.

860-861 A.D. Constantinople besieged for the first time; the Byzantine Empire starts to fall. Arabs at war.

1493-1494 A.D. Second voyage of Columbus to the Americas and Spanish Inquisition. Many believe Columbus was a closet Jew. This is false. He participated in the convert or die missions of the explorers of his time.

1949-1950 A.D. The creation of Israel and the USSR detonates its first atomic bomb.

1967-1968 A.D. Syria attacks Israel along with Egypt. Six Day War begins. Gulf of Tonkin incident causes Vietnam War to intensify.

2014-2015 A.D. ??????

Here is a chart of the last number of blood moons and the events that occurred on Jewish feast days, including the partial eclipses that are claimed to have occurred during the death of Christ.

Why its ridiculous

Basically this list could be compiled with any number of events. I could easily make a similar chart of advances in technology and claim that a new technological advancement will happen this year. Wait! iOS9!!! That’s it!

In addition, it ignores some of the biggest events in Jewish history. Here is a list of major Jewish events not landing in blood moon tetrad years.

70 A.D. Destruction of Jerusalem.

115 – 116 A.D. Second Jewish Revolt.

315 – 337 A.D. Conversion to Judaism made illegal.

711 A.D. Muslims begin domination and persecution of the Jews.

912 A.D. New era of Jewish tolerance. Jews flourish in arab nations and Europe. This period ended with the Cordoba massacre in 1013.

1290 A.D. Jews expelled from England.

1306 A.D. Jews expelled from France.

1492 A.D. Jews expelled from Spain.

1790 A.D. George Washington welcomes Jews to America.

1930’s – 1940’s A.D. Annihilation of European Jews.

These are just some events in Jewish history and they don’t fall on blood moon tetrads. What does this mean? I am sure it means nothing.

Even muddier waters

Now, the blood moon conspiracy in itself is enough to get people excited. To make things worse, Jewish prophecy preachers are also talking about the fact that it is also a Shemitah year (even though its not actually shmita year in the 2nd year of the blood moon tetrad). Combine a blood moon tetrad year with Shmita and boom! End times!

A Shemitah year is basically the last year in the 7 year agricultural cycle for the ancient Jews.

“You may plant your land for six years and gather its crops. But during the seventh year, you must leave it alone and withdraw from it. The needy among you will then be able to eat just as you do, and whatever is left over can be eaten by wild animals. This also applies to your vineyard and your olive grove.” (Exodus 23:10–11)[8]

“God spoke to Moses at Mount Sinai, telling him to speak to the Israelites and say to them: When you come to the land that I am giving you, the land must be given a rest period, a sabbath to God. For six years you may plant your fields, prune your vineyards, and harvest your crops, but the seventh year is a sabbath of sabbaths for the land. It is God’s sabbath during which you may not plant your fields, nor prune your vineyards. Do not harvest crops that grow on their own and do not gather the grapes on your unpruned vines, since it is a year of rest for the land. [What grows while] the land is resting may be eaten by you, by your male and female slaves, and by the employees and resident hands who live with you. All the crops shall be eaten by the domestic and wild animals that are in your land.” (Leviticus 25:1–7)[9]

“At the end of every seven years, you shall celebrate the remission year. The idea of the remission year is that every creditor shall remit any debt owed by his neighbor and brother when God’s remission year comes around. You may collect from the alien, but if you have any claim against your brother for a debt, you must relinquish it. …” (Deuteronomy 15:1–6)[10]

The term Shemitah is actually a loose transliteration of the Hebrew word Shmita (שמיטה).

The reason why it is significant is that usually some sort of market crash has been associated with the Shmita years. Even though, technically 2014 was the Shmita year, many believe 2015 will somehow makeup for it.

Below is a list of supposed Shmita years aligned with their correlating market and/or world events.

1916 – 1917 United States joins WWI. Collapse of the Russian government and the 1917 revolution.

To be fair, assuming these events did actually fall on Shmita years it is quite interesting. However, the Bible never said anything about bad things happening on Shmita years, so it is really moot issue. In addition, the business cycle tends to run in 7-8 year cycles. It’s just a matter coincidence that it sometimes lines up with the Shmita years.

What does this have to do with prophecy?

Short answer: it has nothing to do with Biblical prophecy.

If you follow the terrible prophecy predictions of the TBN community you might be familiar with Irvin Baxter, who is the resident “expert” in End Times Prophecy. He believes, as John Hagee does, that something incredible and terrifying is going to happen this year. But time is running out because September 28th is the last blood moon and so far its been a rather uneventful year. The only tragedy so far has been the republican primary debates.

The closest thing to Bible prophecy dealing with moons is Revelation 6:12-14, which is a re-imagination of Joel 2:30-31.

12I watched as he opened the sixth seal. There was a great earthquake. The sun turned black like sackcloth made of goat hair, the whole moon turned blood red, 13and the stars in the sky fell to earth, as figs drop from a fig tree when shaken by a strong wind. 14The heavens receded like a scroll being rolled up, and every mountain and island was removed from its place. (Revelation 6:12-14 NIV)

30 I will show wonders in the heavens and on the earth, blood and fire and billows of smoke. 31 The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. (Joel 2:30-31 NIV)

Now, in order for this passage to have anything to do with today one has to assume that basically all of Revelation is written as an end times prophecy, with virtually no relevance the audience it was actually written to, in the 1st century. If you don’t subscribe to the Tim Lahaye style interpretation of Revelation then this passage means nothing to you and everything to early Christians.

For those who do think that all of Revelation is a secret road map to the end times, one would have to explain why the stars are not falling to the earth, all the fig trees are not dying, the heavens are not disappearing, and the mountains and islands are not being removed. This might indeed be a little difficult. If these events do occur after the blood moon in September I will gladly eat my own words. Until then, I still hold that this passage has nothing to do with the end times (even though SOME passages in Revelation do actually speak of the end times, just not as many as people like to believe).

So, why the fuss?

Easy….. it sells a lot of books and DVDs. Do you actually think that John Hagee is going to get on TV and apologize after none of his predictions come true? No, of course he won’t. He’s going to roll around in his millions of dollars and then come up with some clever excuse why he thinks he was still correct. In the mean time, he is going to tell a hundred thousand books like all his TBN counter parts and laugh all the way to the bank.

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